IF: CRAVING!

Rose Cupcake
© Diana Ting Delosh
Ink & Watercolor illustration

M-m-m-m! I'm craving a cupcake with chocolate frosting and pink buttercreme roses. This illustration was inspired by this weeks Illustration Friday prompt. M-m-m-m.

IF: BREEZY

Spring Fling
© Diana Ting Delosh
Ink & Watercolor Illustration

Mr Hopwell and Lady Quack are ballooning on a lovely, breezy, spring day. Here's my entry for this week's IF prompt.

IF: CELEBRATE!

FRUIT PUNCH!
© Diana Ting Delosh
Ink & watercolor illustration

Hip, hip hoorah! Pour the fruit punch and make a toast. Cheers - it's time to celebrate. I wonder what good news the animals are celebrating. This is my illustration for this weeks Illustration Friday prompt, Celebrate.

IF: TIME

Time Expired Portfolio

© Diana Ting Delosh

Unfortunately for the ill-fated illustrator on her way to see the NYC Art Director, her portfolio's freshness time was about to expire. TICK... TICK... TICK... BOOM!
My response to this weeks Illustration Fridays prompt: TIME - 1 of my nightmares.

IF: RESOLVE!

Hamster Resolves - © 2009 Diana Ting Delosh.
Ink Illustration.


I, like Hamster, resolve to do many things in 2009. My list, when boiled down to it's essence:

1 - Create art daily!
2 - Do concrete artbiz actions daily!

Felt the need to make Creating Art Daily a Major Focus this year because so much of being an illustrator involves mundane tasks: updating, tweaking,promoting,networking, paperwork, etc. that time for actually creating art seems to be endangered.

IF: CLUTTER

Hamster/Mind Clutter © Diana Ting Delosh Marker

My mind is cluttered: brilliant ideas, daily minutiae,
distracting fears; all muddled together in a mental goulash. The trick is to remember: I am not a hamster.My mind is not my wheel.

IF: POOF!

BIRTHDAY MAGIC
© Diana Ting Delosh
Ink Line & Watercolor

Wish I could just wave my paint brush and POOF art - from my brain into tangible form. The closest thing I come to magic is pulling serendipitous art out of my flat file. Which doesn't happen too often...but this is 1 of those instances. So here is my entry for Illustration Friday - POOF.

Birthday Magic just happens to be something I'm working on for my Greeting Card Store. It still needs to be spiffed up, loaded, OK'd...before Poof it becomes available as a birthday card.

IF: PUNCH LINE!

Moo Shoe Pork
© Diana Ting Delosh
ink & watercolor illustration
Here's my PUNCH LINE. Maybe it's more of a pun. Anyhow hope it makes you smile.

IF: BABY

TV MAMA

© 2007 Diana Ting Delosh. Ink line & watercolor.

This is my entry for Illustration Friday's word of the week - BABY. It is my attempt at an editorial illustration. I had been reading and hearing on the news about how babies were viewing more and more TV.

My current illustration portfolio is geared towards children's publishing. I'd like to expand my repetoire. Have a few more tricks in my bag and be viable to more markets. Any suggestions, comments, hints would be appreciated.

IF: WORRY

Sad Mouse

© Diana Ting Delosh. Ink line and watercolor.

Mouse worried. It was getting dark and her friend, Bird hadn't returned. Something must have happened. All she had was one of his feathers to comfort her.

This illustration is from my book dummy, MOUSE & BIRD.

IF: SEED

MOUSE DREAMS

2008 © Diana Ting Delosh
ink line & watercolor

Mouse dreams of planting her sunflower seed.

More exploration with new style. I like the thick bolder line. Makes me think more graphically. Well - needless to say practice, practice, practice.

IF: WRINKLES

Tortoise © Diana Ting Delosh

Wrinkles look good on tortoises. I don't like them on me - unless of course I could turn into a tortoise or walrus - nor do I like them when they turn up in my plans.

This is a style I am experimenting with. It's still ink line and watercolor but it's a fatter, simpler, looser line with lot's of washy color. A bit of a vacation from my usual more detailed style. Please let me know what you think.

IF: FAIL

UGH! - © 2007 Diana Ting Delosh

The Illustration Friday - word of the week is: Fail

To FAIL, To be a failure - to be a Loser, to be a Reject, etc. Introducing Fern Messy, a character from a picture book proposal I'm currently shopping around. She epitomizes how I feel when one of my proposals is rejected. Even though I know not to take it personally - my gut reaction is to feel like I've failed.

Awhile back I had asked my mentor and friend, the great children's book illustrator and author, Robert Quackenbush if he had any advice on dealing with rejection/failure. He shared his 2 favorite mottos ( borrowed from Winston Churchill):

"Always pass from failure to failure with enthusiasm."

"Never give up! Never give up! No, never, never, never give up!"